Aren’t these flowers lovely? I got them as a gift from my neighbor (Sorry, Commonwealth friends. I’ve been looking all over for an extra supply of the letter u and can’t find any anywhere. I hope I may be forgiven…). If you’ve ever had neighbor who looked after your pet, watered your plants, brought you a cake or watched your children, you know how valuable a kind neighbor can be. It got me thinking about crime-fictional neighbors, and there are all sorts of examples.
Agatha Christie’s The Murder of Roger Ackroyd begins as Hercule Poirot settles into the village of Kings Abbot, where he’s planned to retire. His new neighbors are Dr. James Sheppard and his sister Caroline. At first, the Sheppards don’t know much about Poirot, but one day, Poirot loses his temper at one of his vegetable marrows and throws it, accidentally almost hitting Sheppard. After profuse apologies, Poirot and Sheppard chat a bit, as neighbors sometimes do, and Caroline becomes intensely curious about Poirot. Then, wealthy magnate Roger Ackroyd is murdered. Since Sheppard is a doctor, and was Ackroyd’s friend, it’s not long before Poirot is drawn into the murder. Throughout the novel, it’s interesting to see how Poirot and Sheppard interact, both as neighbors and as people involved in the investigation. And it’s very interesting to get the Sheppards’ perspective on Poirot.
Anthony Bidulka’s Russell Quant is a Saskatoon-based PI, which means he sometimes travels and he certainly has a busy life. That can make it hard for him to do things like taking care of his schnauzer Barbra. Fortunately, his neighbors Kelly and Errall own Barbra’s brother Brutus. They’re always happy to look after Barbra when Russell is away, and of course, he looks after Brutus, too, when it’s needed. He also has an enigmatic but very helpful neighbor called Sereena Orion Smith. She has a way of dropping in just when Russell needs her help. It makes for a solid bond between Russell and his neighbors, and they’ve gotten him out of more than one difficult situation.
In Judy K. Walker’s Back to Lazarus, we are introduced to Sydney Brennan. She’s a Tallahassee-based investigator who does freelance work for various attorneys’ offices. Her neighbor Ben is a sixteen-year-old high school student who takes care of Sydney’s home, feeds her fish, and so on when she’s out of town. She’s come to depend on Ben, and he, in turn, sees her as a trusted person he can talk to when he doesn’t want to talk to his family. The two of them have a solid relationship, and in Back to Lazarus, Ben proves to be especially helpful when Sydney is attacked in the course of one of her investigations.
Kerry Greenwood’s Corinna Chapman is a former accountant-turned-baker who lives and has her bakery in a Roman-style Melbourne building called Insula. She’s got several neighbors: a Wiccan who owns her own shop; two young girls dreaming of becoming soap opera stars; a professor; a group of gamers who repair computers; and a few others. They’ve formed a sold community with each other and are ready to help when needed. For example, the gamers have a company called Nerds Inc. When Corinna needs help with a balky computer, she turns to them. In exchange, she uses her financial skills to help them with business glitches. Favors among the neighbors are freely asked and freely granted.
Karim Miské’s Arab Jazz introduces readers to Parisian resident Ahmed Taroudant. He’s often been helpful to his neighbor, Laura Vignola, who lives in the apartment above his. He waters her plants, and he has an extra key to her apartment in case of emergency. One day, he looks up from his own balcony and sees that she is dead. He rushes to her home and then calls the police. Almost immediately, he becomes a person of interest. For one thing, he had easy access to the victim. For another, he had a sort of relationship with her, although it wasn’t really an ‘official’ romance. So, as you can imagine, he wants to find out who killed Laura, not only to clear his own name, but also to make up for the time they won’t have together. It turns out to be a complicated case, and it’s interesting that the real protagonist in this murder mystery is a neighbor.
And that’s the thing about good neighbors. It can give one a real feeling of safety to know that a neighbor has a spare key, or can help fix or move something, or can watch the children for a bit, or can run an errand. Those bonds can mean a lot, and it can add to a crime novel to have such characters. Of course, as any crime fiction fan can tell you, neighbors are not always what they seem to be. I can’t really discuss particular novels – no spoilers here – but if you read enough crime fiction, you know that a cheerful and helpful neighbor can hide any number of secrets…
*NOTE: The title of this post is the title of a song by the Rembrandts.
Crime Writer Margot Kinberg 